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Making Health Care Work

LOWERING HEALTH CARE COSTS—We’re working to cut costs by cutting waste and focusing on prevention and care that gets results.

LOWER COSTS, BETTER CARE

With the Supreme Court uphold the health reform law, it’s time for the states to move forward to make sure consumers see the benefit of lower costs and better quality coverage.

At stake is how we set up new insurance marketplaces — the single biggest tool we have to clean up health care. The new state insurance exchanges will allow small businesses, those of us who buy health care on our own, and the uninsured to shop for cheaper health care plans and find some relief from increasingly brutal premiums.

Done right, the exchange will save billions and level the balance of power between consumers and the health care industry — driving the industry to cut waste and prioritize high-quality care.

The health care industry has spent millions to influence decisions on health care, so they know how high the stakes are.

In order to help us fight back against the kind of price jumps and trap-door coverage we’ve all been suffering from, ConnPIRG is pushing to see that the exchanges:

Negotiate for better plans. By demanding better care for less cost, the exchanges can use the collective power of hundreds of thousands of consumers to finally demand that the industry does better.

Have high standards, so that bad plans aren’t an option.

Are open to as many people as possible. Limits that shut some individuals and businesses out of the exchanges would reduce its ability to lower costs — and will be a key tactic that industry lobbyists use to weaken them.

Issue updates

This year, the federal health care reforms that ConnPIRG worked to win have started to pay off for young people. In the past, teens saw their premiums soar or were denied coverage when they turned 19, even if they’d been insured their whole lives. Now, they can remain on their parents’ plans until age 26.

For people in their late teens and twenties, getting health insurance can be a lot like a lottery . . .

If you’re lucky, your parents have a good plan that covers you while you are in school or your employer picks up the tab. If you’re not, your options shrink to two: a plan offering good coverage that you can’t afford, or a plan you can afford that covers little to nothing.

U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney visited the University of Connecticut’s Student Union Monday for a roundtable discussion with student leaders about health insurance reform. In an election season dominated by the Tea Party and its cries to repeal Obamacare Courtney found a constituency Monday that supports federal health care reform.

The passage of health reform tonight is a huge step forward for Connecticut. It could not have happened if Representative Larson, Representative Courtney, Representative DeLauro, Representative Himes and Representative Murphy had not put Connecticut interests ahead of powerful Washington lobbies like the health insurance industry.